THOUGHTS IN BRIEF
One startling effect of social media in the new cognitive landscape of infallible opinion is that everyone is an expert. Some celebrity writer posts a disgusting rant about transgender people and all of a sudden all of her supporters are experts in human biology. Russia responds to US and EU provocation by launching an invasion of Ukraine and everyone is suddenly an expert in international human rights law. Most often without even a cursory glance at the relevant Wikipedia article, whatever the subject of the online battle, everyone has their own expert opinion. Everyone is an authority and every authority is at odds with its neighbour.
We know from a number of studies that when someone buys into a conspiracy theory, they are more likely than not to subscribe to a number of conspiracy theories. This is likely the result of the appeal of conspiracy theories to people susceptible to conspiratorial modes of thinking — the result being that multiple conspiracy theories end up floating around the same online echo chambers. Recently I have noticed a particular affection for climate change denial among those who describe themselves as ‘gender critical’ — and this is an interesting connection of conspiracies because of the obvious contradiction of rhetoric; the creed of ‘gender critical’ feminism is that their opposition are ‘science deniers,’ while denying the science is required of ‘climate sceptics.’
More and more often I am encountering ‘gender critical’ friends — and I call them friends because they are friends — engaging in the vilification of Greta Thunberg, the Stop Oil protest movement, and the World Economic Forum because of their ‘lies’ about the Climate Emergency. They are wedded to the thoroughly unscientific belief that climate change is ‘natural,’ that the world’s climate changes in cycles, and that we have nothing to fear. Of course, like many conspiracy theories, this is partially true; the world’s climate does change in cycles. But where climate science acknowledges this natural change, it also points out that what happens naturally over thousands of years is now happening — due to human activity — in decades.
Truth be told, I too like a good conspiracy theory. We all do. The insane complexity of the world — especially given our access to so much information so readily — is frightening. It makes us anxious. Conspiracy theorists, like magical thinking, give us a certain comfort in fictional simple explanations; that someone somewhere, or a ‘cabal,’ is scheming all of this. But the real world is never that simple, and real conspiracies are impossible to keep secret. Sadly — and I would love to believe otherwise (because I am anxious), this is all true. Our over-exploitation of the planet’s resources and our reckless behaviour have stripped the only home planet we have of much of its protections and we are now paying the price. Not being caught in a conspiracy theory means that we have the mental freedom to start thinking about changing things — and time is running out.
Jason Michael McCann M.Phil.
Biblical Studies and Hebrew
Race, Ethnicity, and Conflict
Unprecedented Times 